Demon King Goes In Highschool chapter 2: The King of Hell

The world to which he returned.

Beep— Beep— Beep—

A hospital room filled with warm sunlight.

In that room lay a student who had been in a deep sleep for quite some time.

“Jihak… It’s Mom. Are you still sleeping, Jihak?”

And today, the sad voice of a mother who came to see her son who wouldn’t wake up filled the hospital room.

The student’s name, lying in the hospital room, was Yoo Jihak.

Just a month ago, he was found severely injured at school and transferred to the hospital.

Now, he was declared brain-dead, and organ donation was scheduled for the next day.

“My son… Do you know that Mom is waiting like this?”

Despite his mother’s call, the student lying in the bed did not respond.

Already declared brain-dead, he was breathing but could not be said to be alive.

Swish—

Though it seemed she had no more tears left after crying every day, thick tears began to fall from his mother’s eyes.

“Sigh… I’m sorry. I’m so sorry… What exactly happened that day?”

She was curious.

She wanted to ask.

What on earth had happened at school?

Why were one of Jihak’s ribs broken, two of them cracked, and his whole body covered in bruises?

The school only said he had fallen down the stairs, but his mother couldn’t stop thinking there was more to it.

She carefully touched her son’s face.

He looked as if he might wake up any moment and ask for food, but he continued to sleep.

The mother’s trembling fingertips gently stroked her son’s face.

The thought that she would no longer be able to do even this after tomorrow made her want to feel her son’s warmth as much as possible.

“Sniff… Truly, I’m such a fool…”

With only a day left, she didn’t want to show her son any more of her pitiful side.

As she stood up to wipe away her tears and briefly headed to the restroom, Jihak was left alone in the hospital room.

The room was filled with nothing but silence.

Clang!

But then, a water cup placed on the table beside the bed fell to the floor, shattering the silence.

Rumble—

The hospital room began to shake as if an earthquake had struck.

Boom— Boom—

Crash!

A fairly strong earthquake hit Korea, known as an earthquake-safe zone, causing chaos in the hospital.

Even though she had only gone to the restroom for a moment, Jihak’s mother hurried back to the hospital room, worried about her son amid the turmoil.

“Jihak!”

Strangely, the earthquake that felt like a minor tremor in the restroom seemed much stronger when she returned to the room.

The bed was shaking, and the IV drip connected to Jihak’s body was swaying violently, as if it might fall any moment.

His mother quickly approached Jihak and grabbed the bed.

She shielded her son with her body to protect him from the impact.

“It’s okay. It’s okay…”

Boom!

At that moment.

A loud noise echoed.

The IV drip, which should have been hanging on the stand, began to wobble and fall.

Unfortunately, the IV drip, falling towards Jihak’s mother, was not in her line of sight.

The IV drip was about to hit her head.

Tap—

“Oh my!”

But it didn’t happen.

The earthquake stopped as if it had never occurred, and someone caught the falling IV drip.

“Ji… Jihak?”

“Mo… Mom.”

The person who caught the IV drip was her son, Jihak.

“Are you okay?”

“Are… are you really Jihak? Is it really my son Jihak?”

She couldn’t believe it.

Her son, who had been in a brain-dead state and practically dead for the past month, had woken up perfectly fine.

“It’s me… Mom’s son, Yoo Jihak.”

“Jihak! Jihak!”

His mother hugged him tightly.

As if determined never to let go, even if it was a dream…

* * *

When the news spread that a brain-dead patient had woken up after a month, the hospital was in an uproar.

“It’s a miracle. There’s no other way to explain it.”

A miracle.

Though it was not something a doctor would normally say, there was no other explanation.

“Thank you. It’s all thanks to the doctors.”

Whether it was a miracle or not, it was enough for his mother that her son had woken up.

She was so happy she wanted to stop every passerby to thank them.

“Let’s observe the situation for a few more days, and if everything is fine, then we’ll discharge him.”

“Yes. Thank you. We’ll do that.”

“Congratulations, ma’am.”

Watching his mother repeatedly express her gratitude, Yoo Jihak gave a bitter smile.

‘I’m an unfilial son. What kind of person am I?’

He couldn’t believe a month had passed since he had collapsed.

Thinking about the hardships his mother must have endured during that time made him feel deeply sorry.

“Jihak, is it okay if I leave you alone for a moment?”

“Yes, it’s fine.”

“Mom’s going to step out and buy some fruit. My son has gotten so thin…”

Having woken up after a month, Jihak had lost a lot of muscle and looked very skinny.

His mother wanted to buy his favorite watermelon from the fruit shop in front of the hospital.

“I’ll be back. Wait here.”

Her desire to feed her son good, tasty food.

But his mother still found it hard to leave him, worried about him.

“I’m fine now. You don’t have to worry.”

Knowing his mother’s feelings, Jihak smiled and reassured her.

So Jihak was left alone in the hospital room, with the doctor and his mother gone.

He glanced around and then got out of bed, placing his feet on the ground.

“Whew… There are too many eyes watching, I can’t move freely.”

Though his thin legs seemed weak, Jihak stood up without difficulty and walked around the room.

“A month has passed in the human world…”

He approached the window.

Taking in the view outside, he savored the world he hadn’t seen in a long time.

“Two thousand years have passed since I spent time in hell, but this place remains the same.”

Yoo Jihak looked up at the blue sky he hadn’t seen in a long time, feeling the reality of his return.

“It took so long to come back here.”

Then, he began to reminisce about the past.

Even after two thousand years, the memories of that time were still vivid.

Jihak’s family, who had been living an ordinary life like everyone else, was suddenly destroyed overnight.

It started with his father’s murder charge.

His father, an ordinary man who did his best at work, was arrested by the police one day for murder.

Jihak’s father was the manager of a large building.

One day, a young woman in her twenties was raped and brutally murdered in that building, and his father’s fingerprints were found on the murder weapon.

From that moment, Yoo Jihak’s school life turned into hell.

“Hey, isn’t that kid’s dad a murderer?”

“Damn bastard. If you’re old, you should age gracefully. I heard he also touched a woman?”

“Hey, hey… my uncle is a police chief. They say it’s not just one person.”

Sensational rumors spread quickly, and within days, Jihak was labeled the son of a murderer.

From then on, a few kids took the lead in bullying Jihak.

Other kids didn’t directly participate in the bullying, but they stood by and watched, and the teachers were no different.

“Hey, you damn bastard. Do you know how much loss my dad’s company suffered because your father killed someone?”

Among them, Kim Jihyun was the worst in tormenting Jihak.

Kim Jihyun’s father wasn’t the owner of a large corporation, but he was the president of a solid mid-sized company.

Unfortunately, that company’s office was in the building where Jihak’s father worked.

A brutal murder had occurred in the building, causing the people working there to feel uneasy, and the police investigating the case were frequently in and out, causing disruptions.

Perhaps because of this, Kim Jihyun tormented Jihak mercilessly.

With Kang Hyunmin and Park Doogi, who followed Jihyun, joining in, every day was a living hell for Jihak.

The parents of those kids also worked at the company run by Jihyun’s father, so naturally, they followed Jihyun’s actions and opinions.

Of course, they had their reasons.

They believed it was justice.

At that time, Jihak’s father consistently denied committing the crime, and Jihak went around pleading with people that his father could never have done such a thing.

“Like father, like son… he’s defending his father?”

“Heh heh… maybe he was involved too?”

“Oh really? Then can we attend school with him?”

Their reasons were just excuses.

The kids just needed a reason to bully Jihak.

Despite the relentless bullying, Jihak endured for three months.

He could withstand the terrible pain because he believed in his father’s innocence and waited for the truth to be revealed.

But reality was not always filled with hope and justice.

On the day of Jihak’s accident, he received tragic news from his mother.

His father, who was being held in custody, had taken his own life.

Hearing this news, Jihak felt his mind go blank.

He couldn’t think of anything, and it felt like everything he had believed in was collapsing.

Kim Jihyun and the other kids, unaware of this fact, continued their usual bullying.

On that day, instead of passively enduring as usual, Jihak fought back fiercely.

“What’s wrong with this bastard? Has he gone mad?”

Thud!

Jihyun, who never hit Jihak in visible areas, punched him in the jaw, causing Jihak to momentarily lose consciousness and fall down the stairs.

Seeing Jihak bleeding from his head, the kids looked at him as if they were watching an animal in a zoo, and it was only later that a teacher found him and took him to the hospital.

“Kim Jihyun. Kang Hyunmin. Park Doogi.”

The three who had led the bullying.

They were the kids who had pushed him down the stairs and laughed among themselves.

“I died and went to hell that day, damn it…”

Because of that accident, Jihak’s soul fell into hell.

Normally, when a living being dies and their soul leaves the body, it naturally goes to hell.

Jihak’s soul was no different.

“I escaped death many times.”

But Jihak escaped from there.

Had he followed the natural order, he might have been reincarnated and living a different life by now, but Jihak couldn’t accept that.

He couldn’t leave his mother alone, and he had gained information from other souls on the way to hell.

It was said that if a soul becomes corrupt, it can become a demon.

And if you rise to the top among those demons, you can rule hell.

If, by any chance, his father really did take his own life, his soul would surely end up in hell.

There was no greater sin than taking one’s own life.

So Jihak decided to become a demon and rise to the top.

He wanted to save his father’s soul that had fallen into hell.

After spending a thousand years in hell, Jihak was able to stand at the pinnacle of all demons and desperately searched for his father’s soul.

And then he found out.

“My father didn’t fall into hell.”

Jihak’s father hadn’t taken his own life.